“97 Things Every Cloud Engineer Should Know” is a book of collected wisdom by cloud engineering experts. Our two guests today, Michelle Brenner and Dan Moore, both contributed chapters, and we speak with them about the book and the state of cloud engineering in 2021.

What is cloud engineering?

With most companies having at least part of their infrastructure in the cloud, some form of cloud engineering knowledge is necessary. Dan says, “I would say that a cloud engineer is someone who works in the cloud — public or private. Most people are cloud engineers nowadays, whether they want to be or not.”

Michelle expands on this definition. “A cloud engineer is anyone who wants their application not on their computer and more widely available. Whether it's at a company internally or externally for the whole world to try, it’s just kind of getting it out there and being more widely accessible.”

Gain an edge with managed services 

Dan and Michelle are big proponents of managed services, that is outsourcing tasks to people who know how to solve a given problem better than you do. They acknowledge that it’s a trade-off, but the reduced time-to-market and mental load can make it worthwhile.

Dan says, “It's just so exciting to me, as a developer, to be able to let something that was previously a highly specialized job be taken care of by these specialists. I just don't have to worry about certain aspects and I can focus on building things that I only I could build.”

Become a better engineer

Dan and Michelle come from different backgrounds and levels of experience, but they both have great advice for engineers. Try to have a:

• 15-minute rule (or 30) — Both Dan and Michelle have a time limit when it comes to solving problems, and after it expires, seek help from someone else.



• Beginner’s mindset — Learning how other people approach a problem can expand your perspective. 



• A goal in mind — With so much technology out there, it’s easy to get overwhelmed, especially as a newbie. To avoid this, Michelle suggests always having a specific goal in mind. 



• Increased communication — “Communication is so much more important to becoming a better developer, programmer, or software engineer than I thought it was when I was just starting out,” says Dan.

Get your copy of 97 Things Every Cloud Engineer Should Know to learn more about modern cloud engineering from the experts.



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